Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered a review of U.S. military colleges to determine whether they are “too woke,” as the war in Iran continues to escalate.
“It's my job to make sure those who are rising to the highest of ranks are as prepared as humanly possible,” Hegseth said in a video posted to social media Thursday night.
“And if we're pulling officers out of civilian universities because they're too woke, then we better make sure our own universities are prepared to do the task properly, and we're going to do that.”
Hegseth’s announcement came shortly before he became visibly angered at a press conference Friday morning, during which he urged a "patriotic press” to rewrite headlines about the administration’s deadly and costly war.
The proposed college review will be conducted by a special task force that will evaluate senior service colleges, including institutions such as the Army War College, National Defense University and Marine Corps University, to ensure that “the focus is where it belongs,” Hegseth said.
It will have 90 days to produce a report on whether the schools are "actually effective and… focused on core national security issues.”
War colleges offer an advanced military education to senior officers and Pentagon civilians, with a focus on subjects of strategy, joint operations, and general national security policies. Hegseth said the review would seek to eliminate all parts of the curriculum that were not aligned with such topics.
“We want military leaders who are critical thinkers that have studied the principles on which our founding fathers established this republic, and they're educated and prepared to win wars after the wokeness and weakness of Joe Biden's administration,” Hegseth said in his video.
“Our war fighters deserve training with integrity where the focus is on the warrior ethos, on deterrence and on strength.”

Elsewhere during his Friday press briefing, Hegseth compared Iran’s leaders to “rats” in hiding, boasting: “The U.S. is decimating the radical Iranian regime’s military in a way the world has never seen before.
“We said it would not be a fair fight, and it has not been.”
To date, more than 15,000 Iranian targets have been hit, obliterating the nation's air defenses, air force, and navy, while its missile capabilities have plummeted by 90 percent, Hegseth said.
He warned that Friday, set to be the 14th day of military operations, will be the most intense day of U.S. strikes on Iran to date.
"Iran's leadership is in no better shape. Desperate and hiding, they've gone underground, cowering. That's what rats do,” Hegseth said. The former Fox News host also described Iran’s new leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, as the “so-called not-so-supreme leader” who is “wounded and likely disfigured.”
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